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Washington, D.C. –Today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) delivered the following closing remarks, as prepared, for the hearing on “The Impeachment Inquiry into President Donald J. Trump: Presentations from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and House Judiciary Committee”:
“After hearing the reports and the evidence today, we now know several things with certainty.
“We know that the President was at the center of a scheme to pressure Ukraine to announce an investigation of the President’s political rivals. He applied that pressure by withholding both a White House meeting and vital military aid. He made that demand directly to President Zelensky and confirmed his personal involvement on the White House lawn.
“We know that there are no excuses for this conduct. It is no excuse that President Trump eventually released the aid after his scheme was revealed to the public. And it is no excuse that he insisted that there was no quid pro quo only after his scheme was revealed to the public.
“We know that his actions endangered our national security, putting our alliances our reputation and our safety at risk.
“We know that the President also compromised the integrity of our elections for a corrupt, private, political purpose.
“We know that president Trump, an in an unprecedented act of obstruction, ordered everybody in the executive branch to defy all congressional subpoenas for documents and subpoenas related to the impeachment inquiry.
“And we know that his attempts to solicit a political favor from the government of Ukraine fit a pattern of conduct that the President established in 2016, when he solicited political assistance from the government of Russia.
“That pattern of misconduct undermines our national security and our free and fair elections.
“In abusing his office in this manner, and in obstructing the investigation that followed, we know that President Trump has put himself before his country.
“I am struck by the fact that my Republican colleagues have offered no serious scrutiny of the evidence at hand. They have talked about everything else but they have not offered one substantive word in the President's defense.
“I suspect that is because there is, at base, no real defense for the President’s actions.
“President Trump put himself before his country.
“There is a constitutional remedy for a President who undermines our national security and our elections – who puts his own interests before those of the country. That remedy is impeachment.
“The facts are clear. The danger to our democracy is clear. And our duty is clear.
“President Trump violated his oath to the American people. He placed his own private interests ahead of our own national security and the integrity of our elections.
“Such conduct is clearly impeachable.
“This Committee will proceed accordingly.”
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